The Minister of Defence, Margarita Robles, attended the inauguration of the ‘Juan Sebastián de Elcano’ building, which has 15 kilometres of space for the custody of documentation open to the public.
The Navy now has a new headquarters to store its historical archive. The ‘Juan Sebastián de Elcano’ building has opened its doors with the aim of safeguarding this documentary legacy and facilitating access and research for the public.
TDB keeps you informed. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram
The opening ceremony was attended by the Minister of Defence, Margarita Robles, accompanied by the Chief of Defence Staff, Admiral General Teodoro Esteban López Calderón, and the Undersecretary of Defence, Adoración Mateos.
The minister thanked ‘all those who have made this project possible, because it allows us to highlight what our Navy has been, and to make all those glorious pages of our history known. It means,’ added Margarita Robles, ’bringing this history closer to the public, especially young people.
Also speaking at the ceremony was the Chief of Staff of the Navy (AJEMA) Antonio Piñeiro Sánchez, who acknowledged that this inauguration ‘is the culmination of a long-desired wish of the Navy’.
For his part, Captain Lorenzo Gamboa Pérez-Pardo, director of the new archive, reviewed the most noteworthy features of the building, located in the Campamento district, adjacent to the Cartographic Archive of the Army’s Geographic Centre. These features will enable, among other things, the almost 2,500 annual requests from researchers to be dealt with efficiently. Gamboa also highlighted the value of the Navy’s historical archives, explaining that ‘a very important part of Spain’s history has been written by sailors, on the deck of their ships’.
Memorable pages
The new facilities have three buildings; the first two (‘Nao Victoria 1’ and ‘Nao Victoria 2’) have the measurements of the emblematic ship in which Elcano completed the first round-the-world voyage, while the third emulates the ship ‘Santísima Trinidad’, known as the ‘Escorial de los Mares’.
These new spaces are equipped with the latest technology for the conservation, circulation and consultation of the Navy’s historical documentary collection. The nearly 15 linear kilometres of shelving, as well as the 20 consultation stations and other equipment, have been arranged according to the appropriate criteria and under current regulations. Modernisation and digital transformation are undoubtedly the most important advances in the new headquarters.
The new ‘Juan Sebastián Elcano’ Archive, together with the ‘Álvaro de Bazán’ Archive (Ciudad Real), make up the Navy Historical Archive (AHA), which, together with the intermediate and scientific archives, complete the Navy’s Archival Subsystem, which depends on the Institute of Naval History and Culture (IHCN).
The AHA conserves thousands of documents dated between 1784 and the end of the 20th century which, at the time, belonged to the Secretary of State and the Office of the Navy, as well as to its successors: the Ministry of the Navy and the current Headquarters of the Navy.
The new archive holds such important documents as those of the Malaspina Expedition (1789-1794), the Galley Squadron (18th century), as well as an important collection of manuscript maps and projects for the construction of arsenals and ports. All of them bear witness to the great milestones in our history in which the Navy has played a transcendental role.